Shelter is Necessary for Existence

“Brenda Iijima’s new novel is sick and it’s great. Here’s a portrait of America’s upper middle class, mid-climate-crisis, mid-death-drive, in a haunted house of their own making. Smug materialism, bad thinking, bad relations, jumbo mortgages, hidden handguns, grotesque neocolonialism—it’s all here. If only we could flee this American scene without losing our footing, without sliding into so much pooled blood. If only we could get to another history. But we live in this troubled place too. I was so glad to read a book this smart, this dark, this disturbing, as if expelling me toward a new world.”
—Hilary Plum, author of State Champ

“A spectacular demonstration of verbal acrobatics. It perfectly balances droll observation with quiet terror and social criticism, and the effect is one of the eeriest and funniest horror novels I’ve read. It had me turning pages in every spare minute right up until the shocking end.”
—Sarah Gerard, author of Carrie Carolyn Coco

“Iijima’s second novel delights in minutiae that builds to combine a horror novel, a domestic nightmare, and a vicious critique of what constitutes values, both spiritual and superficial and everything in between, among the upper middle class of New York City. Dumbfounding, unique, relentless and wholly satisfying.”
—Paula Bomer, author of The Stalker

“Shelter is Necessary for Existence will chew you up and spit you out. With razor sharp prose and pitch-black humor, Brenda Iijima delves deep into the mundane violence of privilege and the impossibility of disconnecting oneself from history.”
—Maggie Su, author of Blob

“The ironic title sets the stage for a story that’s claustrophobic and tense, exploring female identity and psychological conflict. The reader is pulled into an existential spiral where the everyday becomes terrifying, the story vividly capturing the suffocating pressure of ‘keep up’ culture. A brilliant, unsettling exploration of what we deny, ignore, and sacrifice in our modern world.”
—Dawn Dawn M. Terrizzi, Special Collections Librarian, Emily Fowler Library (Denton, TX)

“Shelter is Necessary for Existence is right up there with fever dreams like Boy Parts, Cursed Bread, and A Certain Hunger. Dark, atmospheric, and a slow-burn of unease to righteous anger. A stunning novel.”
—Brynn Cassidy, Barnes & Noble bookseller